


Are We Human

by eternaleponine



Series: Penny Dreadful Happily Ever After AU [2]
Category: Penny Dreadful (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-13
Updated: 2014-07-13
Packaged: 2018-02-08 14:45:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1945104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternaleponine/pseuds/eternaleponine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story follows <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/1945056">Beggar at the Feast</a>, which follows <a>Opium Dreams by VelveteenThestral</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Are We Human

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VelveteenThestral](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VelveteenThestral/gifts).



True to his word, Dorian arranged for all of Victor's things to be brought from his old laboratory and lodgings and installed in the spaces that he'd set up for the young doctor in his own home. The implication was that Victor was welcome to stay as long as he liked, with no compensation expected except the (rather dubious, Victor thought) pleasure of his company.

"It's an investment," Dorian told him. 

"In what?" Victor asked. 

"In the future," Dorian replied. "You're meant to be one of the most brilliant minds of your generation, are you not?"

Victor shrugged, not really knowing how to respond to that. Obviously – or maybe not obviously, but how could they have kept the nature of Brona's miraculous recovery from a disease that was almost one hundred percent fatal a secret, particularly for someone in her circumstances – Dorian had some idea what Victor got up to in his lab, the nature of his research and what he had accomplished. 

"I have no doubt that you'll do great things, Doctor Frankenstein," Dorian continued. "Why would I not wish to invest in that?"

After that Victor didn't ask anymore, at least not out loud, although he suspected that it really had more to do with Ethan (and possibly Vanessa) than any effect his work might or might not have on the future.

It wasn't until later that he realized that Dorian had said 'your generation' rather than 'our generation', despite the fact that they appeared, at least outwardly, to be of more or less the same age. But one heard things, whispers and rumors, and there was the fact that somehow Dorian was able to be a food source for Mina (who Victor gave a wide berth, even though Vanessa seemed confident enough that she was not a threat that the pair of them shared a bed) without ever seeming to be depleted in any way. 

With everything Victor had seen in the past few weeks and months, and with everything that he'd done, well... he didn't really bother to question it. He would find out in time, or he wouldn't, but whatever the case, it was entirely possible that Dorian was older than he appeared to be. What did it matter, really? He was kind enough to let Victor stay, and kinder still to not bring up – to him or to the others – that their relationship was, or had been, anything other than a passing acquaintance. 

After that first night, Victor stayed in his own room, surrounded by his own things , although as the days wore on more and more new things accumulated, new clothing and books, a new razor and a post-shaving cream the scent of which brought back memories that made it hard to look Dorian in the eye when he saw him next, and he couldn't help thinking that perhaps it was on purpose. A tease or a dare, he didn't know.

Everyone else had settled in some time before, and they treated the place as if it was their home, as if they belonged there. Victor wondered if he would ever feel so comfortable, but doubted that he would. He was the odd man out, and although he knew that he ought to consider the other inhabitants of the house (at the very least Mister Chandler and Miss Ives) friends, he found himself dodging them when he could to avoid any awkwardness.

At least he had the laboratory as an excuse for why he didn't partake in the more social aspects of household life. He was busy working, was all. It wasn't anything personal.

He'd hoped that a change of scenery would help with the nightmares that plagued him, and for a few days it seemed as if it might. But then one night he woke up with his heart beating itself against his sternum like a caged animal seeking to escape, a scream caught in his throat, and he knew that the reprieve had been temporary.

He untangled himself from the sheets and slipped on the new dressing gown that had appeared one day in his room, along with a pair of slippers that of course fit perfectly, and padded out into the hall, looking up and down and seeing no one. It was late; it was likely that they were all asleep, although it would have seemed to him that a creature like Mina ought to be nocturnal. But the girls' room was far enough from his that he could go an entire day without ever seeing them with little effort, so their lack of presence now wasn't exactly surprising. Ethan and Brona's room was closer, but they were still easily avoided if he so chose.

Victor made his way down the stairs, and the halls were still dimly lit but he wasn't sure that they weren't always, just in case anyone happened to be coming in (or going out, he supposed) at any and all hours of the night. The library door was closed, and he didn't notice the light seeping from beneath the door until he had already pushed it open and stepped inside.

Dorian was sprawled on a couch, and he looked up when Victor entered, a smile forming like he was genuinely happy to see him. "We simply _must_ stop meeting like this," he said, and then more seriously when he saw Victor's face, "Can't sleep?"

Victor shook his head. 

"Is there anything I can do?"

He shook his head again. 

Dorian looked at him for a moment, looking as if he could see right through him to what was inside Victor's head, to the mix of lingering shreds of nightmare and strains of (bitter?)sweet memory of that first night... no, the second night, that they'd spent together. (There were a few scraps of the first night as well, but mostly just the part after, the part where they'd slept, where Victor had been held like he hadn't been since he was a small boy, and his mother was still alive.)

"Don't let me keep you," Dorian said finally.

But Victor hadn't actually come looking for a book. He had plenty of those in his room, all of his favorites, really, dog-eared and worn, their margins filled with his notes. He hadn't even realized it himself when he'd descended the stairs, but this was what he'd come looking for. Distraction, but not words on a page. He'd come looking for Dorian.

"I'd rather you did," Victor said, the words rough in his throat, barely making it past his lips. 

Dorian's forehead furrowed, only for a moment, and then he asked the same question he had previously. "Here, or upstairs?"

"Upstairs," Victor said. "I only want to sleep."

Dorian set aside his book and stood. "I am yours to command," he said.

But Victor didn't want to command him. He just wanted company, and there was no one else to ask for that (and no one else he would have, at any rate). He crawled back into bed – his own bed this time; he hadn't even thought about it until they were already inside – and flipped back the covers to make a place for Dorian beside him.

"There," Dorian said, when they'd sorted out the jigsaw of limbs. "Better?"

"Mm," Victor agreed, his eyes already closing, as if Dorian's mere presence acted as a soporific. He felt Dorian's cheek rubbing against his hair, and without thought he tipped up his face and kissed him, soft and quick, a mere brush of the lips, goodnight.

Days passed, piling up into a week and then another. Winter dragged on, and Victor left the house only when absolutely necessary, dreading the bite of the cold that too easily seeped into his bones and lingered. He spent most of his waking hours in his lab, where no one was allowed without his permission.

He'd managed to acquire some of Professor Van Helsing's things after his death, and there was a certain amount of comfort to be had in trying to pick up where the old man, his friend, had left off, even if many of the samples were old and of dubious value.

"Have you taken a break at all today?" 

Victor started, and hoped that Dorian (the voice was unmistakable, he didn't need to look) somehow hadn't noticed the twitch. He forced himself to keep looking through the microscope. "I've been working."

_And you shouldn't be down here,_ was implied in his tone. Did the man not know how to knock? Or did he simply not think it necessary, considering that this was his house, and he was the one paying for nearly everything Victor had.

Or perhaps he had knocked and Victor hadn't heard it.

"You ought to at least eat something," Dorian replied.

"How do you know I haven't?" Victor asked. But of course he knew. There was little that happened in the house that Dorian didn't know, he was fairly certain.

Dorian didn't even dignify the question with an answer. "I brought you down some tea," he said. "Surely you can look up from what you have there for a few minutes, at least?"

The words summoned a memory, a conversation that at the time he'd almost dismissed because he'd had bigger, more important things to worry about... and those things – that thing – had stripped him of the possibility of ever having another conversation like it.

_"You cannot live only in your work."_

_"My work is... preoccupying."_

_"I was much the same. Never looking up from the cadaver, I imagined that I was content. And then one day, having lunch bent over my anatomy books, I looked up. And there she was. Pale blue dress with embroidered flowers. So, look up, my friend. Our work cannot control us. We must control it."_

His friend's voice in his ear, like a whisper. At the time he'd replied, saying, "If only we could."

But he could now, couldn't he? He had. 

He looked up.

He looked up and saw the face of a man who had invited him to come stay, hardly knowing him at all, and who had been nothing but kind since. Whose bed he had crawled into several more times for comfort and found it every time, with no expectation of anything else. Who asked nothing of Victor that he wasn't willing to give.

He looked up and saw the face of the man who had been the first person to kiss him, to touch him, the first person he'd trusted with his body at its most vulnerable... the first and only. And he remembered that night, and thought about it more than he cared to admit even to himself, because it felt like admitting to a weakness, a personal failing, but it wasn't really. It wasn't weakness to feel passion. It wasn't weakness to wish for the company of another person, for companionship or otherwise. Desire wasn't a weakness. It was human. It meant he was alive.

"Set it down," he said, indicating the tray that Dorian held, and a table off to the side that was mostly clear. 

Dorian did as instructed, and Victor stood up, closing the distance between them so that when Dorian turned back around he was there. Close. Almost too close, but no, just close enough. He reached up, one trembling hand on either side of Dorian's neck, his thumbs pressing against the angles of his jaw.

For a moment he just looked at him, just stared into his eyes like he was searching for something, and he was, he supposed. Acquiescence, perhaps, but more than that. A spark, something to indicate that what he felt was returned. And for a second there was nothing there but confusion, and he almost let go and backed off, thinking that he'd gotten it wrong.

But then it cleared, and what he saw was more than a spark. It was a glow, a warmth that melted places in him that were buried so deep he'd stopped noticing they were frozen. Dorian made no move, so Victor did.

He kissed him. Soft at first, but then harder, a question and a demand at once, and it was answered and the answer was yes, yes of course, and Dorian's hands came up to the small of his back, not gripping but just resting there, gently holding but not restraining, and Victor melted a little more.

When he broke the kiss it was because his all too human body required oxygen. His hands slid from Dorian's neck to his upper arms, holding on to steady himself as the world spun a little too quickly around him. 

"Will you join me?" he asked. "For tea?"

Dorian's smile was like sunshine, brighter than anything that made its way through the windows high up on the walls. "I would like nothing better."


End file.
